I think in our case the advantages would be
a) it saves a lot of volunteer time because applications would need much less assessment b) it protects the system from the perpetual accusation that "there are some people who always get scholarships" c) it also removes "skill in writing applications" as a factor in deciding who gets a scholarship
The drawback would be d) arguably it might reduce the impact of the event, if quality of application is in fact linked to the impact from a particular person attending the conference
It's worth noting that the other big movement event, the Wikimedia Conference, does not award scholarships based on applications, or merit - the WMF just funds whoever various chapters and user groups want to attend (which is more often a case of who's the first to put up their hand, or the last to run out of the room, than any kind of rigorous process)
Not saying that a lottery would necessarily be the right answer but the more I think about it the more I think "well, what IS the case for application-based scholarships, and do they really achieve the goals for the event?"
Chris
On Thu, Jun 7, 2018 at 8:13 AM, Federico Leva (Nemo) nemowiki@gmail.com wrote:
Chris Keating, 05/06/2018 18:53:
Thinking about it, drawing lots might not be the silliest idea in the universe.
Sure. It's used in several kinds of official selections and there's ample research on the effects. That said, it's rarely popular, because it's often perceived as a failure or last resort.
Federico