Wiki Loves Women/ Focus Group Rwanda
Wiki Loves Women in General
[edit]The initiative is related to the Wiki Loves Women project. Wiki Loves Women contributes towards the UN’s SDG 5 Gender Equity: achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls. Within the 2030 Wikimedia Strategy, the Wiki Loves Women project works towards resolving several recommendations, and in particular Invest in Skills and Leadership Development.
Focus Group
[edit]The Wiki Loves Women team recently created a Focus Group. Its membership is made of 12 women, the majority of which from Africa. I am one of its members. The main goal of the Focus Group is skills transfer and also to raise awareness of and action to counter the lack of representation of women generally, and more specifically on online platforms such as Wikipedia (or Wikiquote). There are many important and contentious issues within the Gender space, however, the group is not aimed at unpacking those. Rather it is aimed at transferring vital skills towards women and men – digital, technical, researching, writing and leadership – that allow them to access information in order to make up their own minds within their cultural specificity. The group will operate through training, mentoring, online learning, peer-to-peer support.
Wiki Loves Women in Rwanda
[edit]Wiki Loves Women initiative in Rwanda with a focus of bridging two significant gaps on Wikimedia projects – women and Africa – both in terms of content about these subjects and in terms of participation by people from these groups. The project is designed to leverage Wikipedia’s role as a global repository for the dissemination of information to achieve accessible and fair online representation of notable women in Africa. It encourages the contribution of existing researched and verified information by civil society organizations to Wikipedia with the intent of redressing the systemic bias online about women. The donated data and content specifically focuses on women’s contribution to the political, economic, scientific, cultural and heritage landscape, as well as the current socio-political status of women in each country that it is instigated. global #SheSaid campaign organized by the Wiki Loves Women team, by engaging new and current members of Rwanda local community in creating or improving wikiquote, Wikipedia and WikiCommons entries related to women engaged in Business activities in Rwanda.
Wiki Loves Women Activities
[edit]The project has the following main activities:
- Preparation and Planning: August 2021- September 2021
- 3 edit-a-thons in person. This entails:
- The 1st event being: Launching the project: October 2021 - The 2nd being an edit-a-thon; - The 3rd event being the closing event (between September, half-day).
- 1 online follow-up session with participants who won't make it to the physical meet-up due to covid prevention measures.
- Reporting and Closing : December -January 2021
Organizers
[edit]Mentors
[edit]- User:Anthere Florence Devouard
- User:Islahaddow Isla Haddow Flood
- User:Shoodho Candy Khohliwe
Outcomes
[edit]- 23 participants
- 638 articles contributed
- 2 events organized
- Increased info accessibility to notable women in business in Rwanda
Resources
[edit]- Wiki in Africa website: http://www.wikiafrica.net/projects/wiki-loves-women/
- Website : http://www.wikiloveswomen.org