At what time would you consider a new thread to be necessary? This seems as good a time as
any to me. We appear to have a problem, We should try to find out it this is really the
case, and if so, do something constructive. Wikimania is going to happen again, and it
would be nice to get it right some time, if we are not getting it right already. Maybe
this should go off-list, but I think it should not be dropped altogether.
Cheers,
Peter
From: Wikimania-l [mailto:wikimania-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Isaac
Olatunde
Sent: Tuesday, 23 May 2017 10:37 AM
To: Wikimania general list (open subscription)
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Granting Scholarship to same persons every year
Greetings,
Thanks for that thoughtful comment, User:Viswaprabha. However, while it's a good idea
to discontinue this thread, I don't think new thread on Wikimania scholarship is
necessary at this time.
Regards,
Isaac.
On Tue, May 23, 2017 at 12:16 AM, ViswaPrabha (വിശ്വപ്രഭ) <viswaprabha(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Dear all,
Since this thread has gone so long, let me take a bit more freedom to intervene yet
another time:
I said I am sad for my name was (perhaps) unnecessarily dragged into the list. But I have
not felt a bit, even for a moment, that Praveen intended any real harm or hurt for me. His
original intention could have been just that he wanted everyone into looking at a genuine
generic issue and get it discussed and resolved on the long term.
As I have mentioned earlier, I have great respect to Praveen's contribution towards
our rather small but a very active and well-knit community. If someone asked me to name
the most significant users who influenced the positive growth of our community, he would
be included in the top three or four in the list without a doubt. That he was not
considered for the scholarship even for once is a matter that I too feel sad about, even
though he is one among the few whom I have never known as a real world person. He has kept
his anonymity so very well that also makes him continue as a true unbiased warrior of our
community. I am not sure, but perhaps his self-chosen anonymity could have limited his
abilities to participate in off-wiki activities and thus reducing his scores counted for a
scholarship.
In any case, I feel that this thread has grown way beyond its true original intended
purpose.
May I request all of you to call it a break and stop this thread here and start a fresh
one just focusing on how to reduce any imperfections if at all, in our methodologies to
select scholarship winners in even better ways?
Love and smiles to all and hail Wikipedia!
User:Viswaprabha
On 23 May 2017 at 09:18, praveenp <me.praveen(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Thank you Kerry for perfect analysis. I had almost lost hope here. :-)
On Monday 22 May 2017 05:38 PM, Isaac Olatunde wrote:
Greetings,
I want to agree with Gnangara that the OP has no intention to attack the user who was
cited as an example. Saying User:XYZ received a scholarship consecutively is not an attack
but a statement of fact (if their claim was actually correct). To be honest, interpreting
OP's concern as an attack, jealousy etc. is far close to assuming good faith. However,
I don't think I'll be interested in a discussion that focus on "Why was
User:XYZ awarded a scholarship and not me?" but would be interested in a discussion
that focus on how to improve the selection process".
As you can see, it is not easy to convince the problem even with an example. Please
don't misinterpret this. Attending Wikimania on scholarship is not my final intention.
Unlike most other users, I am pretty anonymous, it gives me more freedom than them.
Some years back, there was a huge rift between Wikimedia and Malayalam Language
community. A large part of community stopped active participation after that. In my own
case, last year after someone told me that some of my contributions were not that
important, I didn't want to do that. We really wish to avoid such situations. As a
small community, every user is important.
I really didn't intend to be rude or bully. English is just not my native language.
Regards,
Isaac (who has never received a scholarship or apply for one this year)
On Mon, May 22, 2017 at 6:12 AM, Peter Southwood <peter.southwood(a)telkomsa.net>
wrote:
Fair comment, and actionable suggestions.
P
From: Wikimania-l [mailto:wikimania-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Kerry
Raymond
Sent: Monday, 22 May 2017 4:57 AM
To: 'Wikimania general list (open subscription)'
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Granting Scholarship to same persons every year
This observation has been made by a few people (some of them involved in the scholarship
decision-making process) is that past recipients often continue to out-perform others in
terms of the criteria in subsequent years. What hasn’t been commented on is why this is
so?
If we believe that an attendee to Wikimania benefits in terms of learning new skills,
hearing new ideas, making new contacts, then we should hardly be surprised if an attendee
is then in a position to “grow” as a Wikimedian and hence be more able to “out-compete”
others who didn’t have the benefit of attending. (And If we don’t believe that attendees
benefit or grow from Wikimania attendance, then we should stop running Wikimania). Also
the scholarship recipient has an expectation to share with their community what they have
learned, even that process of sharing adds to their list of activities that they can use
as evidence as subsequent scholarship applications.
Aside. If you have read the book Freakonomics or followed their blog, you will be aware
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freakonomics
of their study of how professional footballers tend to have their birthdays clustered in a
few months of the year and how this phenomenon has its roots in spotting football talent
in very young players and then training them. Because junior sport is usually based around
age limits with a specific cut-off day, the children who just exceed the age limit by a
month or two will usually be less physically developed than those who exceed the age limit
by 10 or 11 months. Thus, the older children in the cohort are more likely to be selected
for the team and receive coaching. Next year (still with a relative age developmental
advantage AND with one year of extra coaching) these older children in the cohort are
again appear the most able and again selected for the team (giving them yet another year
of coaching benefit over those not selected). This cycle repeats throughout their
childhood ensuring the older ones within the “age year” are disproportionate represented
in both junior sport and then into college and professional sport, giving rise to the
observed clustering of birthdays in professional footballers.
This is exactly the same phenomenon as we are seeing with Wikimania scholarships.
How can the playing field of Wikimania scholarships be made a little fairer? I don’t think
the answer lies in deducting some points from those who have had a scholarship before. I
think the solution lies in having two streams of scholarships, one for the first timers
who compete among themselves on criteria that assesses their *potential* to “grow” through
the Wikimania experience and a second set of scholarships for those who are applying to
come for a second/third/… time with criteria more appropriate to that group, how much did
they “grow” and how much did they “share” relative to the number of Wikimania
opportunities they have had (note one might also want to include attendance at Wikimedia
Conference and other similar movement events in this regard)?
Note in both streams it is still possible to include factors like the Global North/South
issue, minority groups, etc in the criteria as consistent with the movement’s strategic
goals. The key difference is whether you are assessing only potential for growth from
attending for the first-timers as opposed to observed growth from past attending and
likely potential for further growth from additional attendance for the repeaters.
If that approach is taken, then the only question that remains is the relative number of
scholarships (or amount of funds) available in each of the two streams. Obviously there’s
a range of possibilities, but I would be tempted to operate on a simple pro-rata principle
at least in the first year of operation. After the weeding out of the ineligible or people
who show poorly against the criteria (however many phases there are to do that), look at
the size of the two remaining groups and go pro-rata. That is, if after the preliminary
cull(s), there are 200 potential first-timers and 100 potential repeaters, then allocated
twice as many scholarship (or twice as much funding) to the first-time group as to the
repeater group. If that does not seem to produce a good mix of attendees, then tweak it
whichever way seems appropriate the next year.
My key point is to stop comparing a basket of mixed apples and oranges and start comparing
apples with apples and oranges with oranges. That should give you mix of the best apples
and the best oranges.
Kerry
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