Grants talk:Conference/Wikimedians of the Caribbean User Group/The Wiki Caribbean Forum

WMF Feedback

Dear team, Thank you for submitting this informative proposal! We are happy to explore the opportunity to support you in hosting the first Wiki Caribbean Forum meeting.

Your proposal has many strengths to highlight. I especially appreciate the role you are taking as regional leaders and the efforts in identifying the unique challenges. I reviewed your proposal, and have some follow up questions and comments to offer as a part of staff review:

First, as we discussed before - In our current round of proposals we will only be accepting proposals for events between August 2020 - January 2021. Meaning, we will not be able to accept this proposal if you would like to host the conference in June, as indicated on the proposal. The comments below take into consideration you postponing the conference to a later date. And when doing so, please consider the final announcement date (March 20) and the essential time needed to organize such a conference, given the capacity and experience required. Please amend the event date on the proposal, before February 25, 2020.

Community input

• What kind of capacity building training are you doing to encourage local units to act more independently? I am missing a clear understanding of the kind of training needed, and specific skills you would like to work on.
• I appreciate the thought around the different stages of Wiki users. This can be a good opportunity for us to case study the creation of regional leadership that fosters programmatic work.
• More than 3000 responses to the survey is a remarkable achievement! Do you have any Data on how many of which were editors (as opposed to readers)?

plan

• Based on our previous talks, I am not clear about the general framing for the conference - is it a leadership working group meeting, or an engagement conference for existing community and newcomers? From the scope of the event (15-30 p) it looks like a smaller working group, but you also mentioned 50% newcomers and a focus on having new people, in addition to WMF staff, students, lecturers and others. So I need more clarity on the focus.
• Can you please share more about your objectives, and how you will measure those? What will success look like? What will be the indication that you achieve those goals you mentioned? Do you have any metrics?
• The Friendly space policy link is broken.

Participation

• I suggest you be very clear with how many spots you are allocating to each chapter and UG, and what are the criteria. From our experience, when it comes to regional convenings, it’s important to make sure there is representation and inclusion, but at the same time, for the meeting to be impactful and effective.
• Reg the scheme - it’s your choice to make if you want it internal or public. But keep in mind that we will ask (in our routine meetings) about your selection criterion and the different elements of diversity.
• 17 scholarships - meaning the rest will be locals?
• Reg risks - do you require any special government permissions?
• Does the group currently have a multi-user bank account dedicated to the group's activities only? Or are you planning to have an org serve as fiscal sponsor?
• Who are the people who should pay the $50 per day conference fees? Are those the local participants? $50 per day is a very high fee for Wikimedia conferences. Is there a reason for asking participation fees? Because I don't see it reflected as an additional revenue.
• The numbers for the total amount on the budget table (bottom right) doesn't add up. The total amount (minus the $5,150 Alternate sources of funding) should be $24,700, and not $29,850 as indicated. I suggest you review the numbers and revise.

• Please add links to the User pages of the Primary contact person.

When you're able, please respond to the questions above and revise the proposal as needed. These revisions will be due by 25 February 2020, after which the Conference Grant Committee will begin formal review of the proposal. Thank you again for your significant role in supporting the wiki Caribbean community. Best CAlmog (WMF) (talk) 12:00, 18 February 2020 (UTC)